


Petit Four

by doomcake



Series: rock you like a hurricane (30_ballads) [4]
Category: Katekyou Hitman Reborn!
Genre: Drama, Gen, Suspense, Unresolved Ending, drabble (short fic)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-01-26
Updated: 2009-01-26
Packaged: 2018-11-05 18:55:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 586
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11019501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/doomcake/pseuds/doomcake
Summary: Gokudera scrambles to diffuse a ticking time bomb at Vongola headquarters.





	Petit Four

**Author's Note:**

> 2017 NOTES:  
> Lol, I remember writing this in the middle of the night on a completely random whim because I had a song stuck in my head. Definitely feeling "the lady or the tiger" kind of a vibe with that ending.  
>   
> Another [](http://30-ballads.livejournal.com/profile)[**30_ballads**](http://30-ballads.livejournal.com/) prompt: "4 Minutes" - Madonna (feat. Justin Timberlake & Timbaland)

  
_The road to Hell is paved with good intentions_  
But if I die tonight, at least I can say I did what I wanted to do  
Tell me, how about you?  
—from Madonna's _4 Minutes_  


 

 

The clock is _tick-tick-_ ticking, each second coming a breath sooner than the last as the commodity of time speeds up and becomes a luxury too expensive to pull in the reins on. It’s like a rock rolling downhill, picking up momentum as gravity’s pull fuels its acceleration, the same way it pulls on the sweat beads forming across Gokudera’s forehead and pulls them into his eyes while he’s trying to pay attention to what he’s doing.  
  
The red numbers are dropping, dropping under the weight of gravity and Gokudera’s sweat and fumbling fingers that are coated in axel grease–  
  
He takes a deep breath, and tries hard not to think too hard about how each second he hesitates, the red-lettered seconds move down. Far more often, he assembles and detonates his own bombs – taking them apart and making them not explode; this is a new realm entirely. Especially since this is someone else’s modification on one of his personal models.  
  
He’s not sure if it’s some sick kind of flattery, or a blatant message to him personally. But this is also a blatant attack against the Vongola – it’s in the half-demolished estate in Osaka, and Gokudera hasn’t had time to think – doesn’t want to think – about what might have happened to the Tenth in the first round of explosions.  
  
Another deep breath, and it takes too long to get his giddy thought train back on the task on hand. _Four minutes left._ His world is narrowing down to a set of wires and switches and detonators. When one fails, there is at least one failsafe, if not more, to ensure the device does its job. He’s got to find them all, or–  
  
_No. Not the Tenth’s time to die._ And he keeps working.  
  
Three minutes, thirty seconds.  
  
His hand slips, he loses a breath and two, three heartbeats before he realizes the bomb didn’t explode in his face.  
  
Two minutes, forty-five seconds.  
  
He cuts his finger on a wire, and now his blood is mixing with the sweat and grease on his hands. Is he even getting anywhere?  
  
Two minutes.  
  
Its wiry innards are spilling out of its slit metal belly and the red numbers are still going _down down down tick tick tick_ , like it committed seppuku and somehow managed to survive. And it’s then that Gokudera wonders what it’s like to die.  
  
_And who’s going to protect the Tenth when you’re gone?_ – except, he already knows the answer to this because it’s also on his mind. He doesn’t deserve the consideration, except now all his reasons for stopping this _fucking piece of shit_ are selfish.  
  
Every. Last. One.  
  
One minute, ten seconds.  
  
His heart is pounding in his ears, and at this point, he’s swearing to all the gods he knows – Japanese, Roman, it doesn’t matter which ones – that he’s never going to build another goddamn explosive ever again, so long as he gets out alive.  
  
Forty-five seconds, and he’s berating himself for sounding so weak.  
  
This is a man’s job, and he’s going to do it like a man, or fail like a man.  
  
… He won’t admit that those are tear tracks in the grime and blood on his hands – it’s just more sweat.  
  
Five seconds. _Tick_ – four. He smiles. _I’m sorry._ Three, two, one –  
  
_Click._  
  
  
  
  
**_fin._**


End file.
